Where Reality Meets Imagination

Tag Archives: Pumpkins

It has been a year since I wrote about Halloween in the marina. A year later, things have gotten much bigger. Blame our neighbour Mimz for this. She went on a shopping tear last year after Halloween and purchased all things scary at a ridiculously low price. My best friend and I added a few items to the display this year at full price. The results were spectacular.

Halloween is actually the melding of two celebrations, Samhain and All Souls Day both having to do with death. The ancient Celtic day of Samhain (pronounced Sahwin or Savin) which celebrates death and rebirth was, as has been the case with most Pagan celebrations, taken over by Christians to become All Souls Day (1st of November). Put them together and what have you got? Bibbidi Bobbidi Boo….Halloween.

Since those more serious days of celebration, we have turned the whole adventure into a night where kids dress up as anything and go from door to door collecting treats. That began where all commercial things begin….America, the good old USofA. It has, I fear to divulge, become larger here in England now. Every year it gets bigger. The shops are full of Halloween festooning decorations and costumes. I hear people complain that it’s just another reverse colonial move on the part of Americans to commercialize everything. Actually, young mums love it because the kids insist on having it and it can be fun dressing up and filling bags with sweets.

Years ago, I was a Christian. The hardliners (like my folks) hated the celebration because they thought it promoted demonic goings on. Whereas there is always an element who use the night for doing dastardly deeds, most people walk about, going from door-to-door, dressed up in costume and saying ‘Trick or Treat.’ Most kids over here don’t even know what that means. They are still novices in all things Halloween American style.

So, here we were again. Another year and another display. Mimz never does anything in a small way. She invited anyone she met to come along at Halloween for sweets, hot chocolate, hot dogs and adult beverages. They weren’t just coming to see the boats. We had the whole area set up like some haunted graveyard that had been left derelict for years, complete with cobwebs, spiders, gravestones, lighted pumpkins, bats (rubber) and a gateway over our arch that read ‘Keep Out.’ Black cloth hung from the sign, shredded into strips to add that scary entrance quality that completed the effect.

At the end of the jetty between Eddie’s and Mimz’s boat and ours, we have a small fir tree. Over it I put a white sheet with a skeleton face in it that we lit with a torch (flashlight). Such are the lengths we go to raise money for the hospice where Eddie works and Mimz volunteers. We raised over £150 during the weekend leading up to the big day and the money keeps coming in. The weather didn’t cooperate, blowing a gale and scattering some of our decorations hither and yon. But we rallied and fixed the old graveyard each day. Fortunately, Halloween was clam and quite mild.

My werewolf costume scared the little kids half to death. Result. One little girl was so traumatized, my best friend told me to remove my mask and smile at the little creature. I did and she cried. Oh well. Meanwhile, Eddie’s Bose speakers belted out spooky music and Freddy Kruger scared even more kids. The hot chocolate flowed and the hot dogs were consumed. Sweets disappeared and batteries wore down. Kids showed up in an array of costumes from skeletons and vampires to a devil princess and a pumpkin. Even Harry Potter made an appearance.

At this juncture, I would love to have shown you some amazing photos of the display, the costumes and the night. Alas, the camera I ordered from Amazon didn’t come on time and my mobile phone snaps turned out black….all of them. Spooky.